Are your family trips an exercise in pleasure or comfort? Behavior economics guru Dan Ariely notes that there's a vivid difference between the two... and it may mean the difference between a fantastic vacation and...

People with disabilities shouldn't have to try and pass as able in the workplace, says writer and comedian Maysoon Zayid. But the sad reality is that America's largest minority remains invisible throughout popular...

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Big Think and the Mental Health Channel are proud to launch Big Thinkers on Mental Health, a new series dedicated to open discussion of anxiety, depression, and the many other psychological disorders that affect millions worldwide.

Michael S. Gazzaniga

Cognitive Neuroscientist

Michael S. Gazzaniga is a professor of psychology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he heads the new SAGE Center for the Study of the Mind. He is one of the leading researchers in cognitive neuroscience, the study of the neural basis of mind. In 1961, Gazzaniga graduated from Dartmouth College. In 1964, he received a Ph.D. in psychobiology from the California Institute of Technology, where he worked under the guidance of Roger Sperry, with primary responsibility for initiating human split-brain research. In his subsequent work he has made important advances in our understanding of functional lateralization in the brain and how the cerebral hemispheres communicate with one another. Gazzaniga's publication career includes books for a general audience The Social Brain, Mind Matters, and Nature's Mind. His most recent book Who’s In Charge investigates the question of free will in light of current neuroscience.

I don’t think we’ve conceptualized yet well enough how the brain gets its job done to abstract all of that activity in our brain into meaningful units to which we can then think about how to move those around to...